Societal Contribution

The Hg Foundation

Removing barriers to education & skills in technology

Launched in July 2020, The Hg Foundation seeks to remove barriers to education and skills in technology to encourage a greater diversity of entrants into tech careers. To achieve this, The Hg Foundation supports the teaching of maths, coding, numeracy, and IT support skills to harder-to-reach students in countries where Hg invests. We team up with experienced and proven partners across Europe and the US, providing funding and operational support where we can demonstrate measurable, long-term and scalable impact. We work with leading researchers to qualify and build the most effective themes and access the best partners. The Foundation is funded through a proportion of carried interest from current and all future Hg funds and a proportion of Hg’s annual profits, we project on average over $5 million of annual commitments over the first ten years. It is our ambition to build a portfolio of up to eight ‘world class’ scalable programmes over the next five years.

Key partnerships:

The Hg Foundation is funding a unique programme aimed at raising attainment and progression in advanced mathematics among young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. The scheme provides online learning, bespoke e-mentoring, face-to-face masterclasses, as well as professional learning support for teachers.

One of four tutoring charities involved with the pilot of an online tutoring model which supported the launch of the National Tutoring Programme (NTP). We are also funding a pilot to test the efficacy of a hybrid model of in-person and online tutoring. As part of this project we are providing reconditioned computer hardware to pupils learning online at home.

The Hg Foundation is proud to have been one of the founding partners of Impetus’ online tutoring pilot which delivered over 9,800 tutoring sessions to almost 1,500 students between June to October 2020. With evidence showing school closures were widening the attainment gap between disadvantaged children and their peers, the pilot was a direct response to the Covid-19 pandemic. The findings of the pilot were part of the evidence underpinning the NTP.

The Hg Foundation funded a 300-hour immersion programme for Black, Latinx & Native American college sophomores majoring in computer science, engineering and related fields. Including a six-week summer intensive and additional year-round projects to aid the development of the technical and soft skills required to successfully compete for entry-level tech roles in the industry.

In partnership with The Hg Foundation, upReach have launched a new tailored programme of support for 500 undergraduates from disadvantaged backgrounds.

Students in the upReach Tech500 will participate in an intensive programme, including Skills Workshops, Employer Insight Days and Career Academies to broaden horizons and support them in securing graduate roles in the tech sector.

Societal contribution continued

Hg’s Charity Committee budget was increased to support more causes during Covid-19 and during the course of the year nearly £200,000 was donated to over 50 organisations, including: the Anna Freud Centre, Mary’s Meals, Mencap, Child Mind Institute, The Alzheimer’s Society, The Royal Marsden Charity and Centrepoint. These organisations are based in the UK, Germany, and the US. Following the horrific explosion in Beirut in August, Hg also gave to the Lebanese Red Cross and LIFE Generation.

In addition to monetary donations, Hg organised some virtual events to get our colleagues engaged, these included:

The 2.6 challenge is a national competition set up in lieu of the London Marathon to offset the fall-off in charitable donations. 14 members of staff and their families got involved in different ways over a two-day period.

Independent Age is a UK charity focused on loneliness, poverty and health and care amongst those in older age. Some of Hg’s staff have volunteered to have regular calls with vulnerable, older, lonely people in London. This activity has forged lasting positive relationships and made a big difference to both the elderly and our colleagues.

Impetus Triathlon is a sports event organised by UK charity Impetus for private equity firms. In 2020, Hg entered 5 teams. We are very proud that two of our colleagues came 1st on the Speed Leaderboard in the 1.5km Swim Challenge and the 20km Cycle Challenge. The Hg team managed to raise a total of £15,600.

The Brilliant Breakfast is an initiative run by the Princes’ Trust to raise money for young women who need extra support. Hg hosted a virtual Brilliant Breakfast for Hg’s women in October 2020. We had over 40 people join virtually and guest speaker Gabby Logan shared her journey, the women who have inspired her along the way and hurdles she has had to overcome. The team managed to raise £3,000.

During the month of June, Hg’s Portfolio Team organised the ‘Big Fat Quiz’ and 89 teams from across Hg and our portfolio companies entered. It was a great way to encourage further networking and collaboration across the Hg family of businesses, while at the same time raising money for worthy causes. The prize included £10,000 which was donated to the winners’ charities of choice.

Societal contribution continued

Enhancing Hg’s charity programme and staff engagement with Benevity

Following Hg’s investment in Benevity, the charitable donation and volunteering management platform, Hg is happy to announce that we are launching their solutions for our own in-house charitable giving programme in April 2021. Benevity’s global platform enables us to engage our staff in supporting the causes and issues which they care about, through a database of nearly 2 million vetted non-profit organisations worldwide. This fantastic staff engagement tool provides:

  • Real time matched giving budgets for every staff member.
  • Much greater and easier access to volunteer opportunities and matched rewards given on any logged volunteer hours.
  • The ability to create fundraising or volunteering missions and more easily support colleagues’ own initiatives.
  • The opportunity for staff to support causes most meaningful to them via payroll deduction, credit card and PayPal payments.
  • Hg’s Charity Committee with more scope to promote charities and giving/volunteering opportunities.